| “ | Rather than becoming gods, they had transformed themselves into devils. | ” |
–Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children, Miss Peregrine | ||
The Experiment of 1908, also known as the infamous event of 1908, was the event that created the hollowgasts.
History[]
Books[]
Myron Bentham knew of an arcane, largely forgotten procedure which was meant to collapse loops quickly and permanently in an emergency. After he was imprisoned by his brother Caul, he used it in his plan to get rid of the Claywings by writing it out on the floor of his cell as an obscure loop manipulation technique that could reverse and eliminate the dangers of aging forward. One member of the Claywings, whose sympathy Myron had earned, took credit for the technique and brought it to Caul, who believed it.[1]
In preparation for the experiment, Caul attempted to get his sister, Alma Peregrine, to help him, but she declined. Despite being warned about what could happen by the European Council of Ymbrynes, Caul decided to go through with the plan anyway, and in the summer of 1908 he led several hundred members of the Claywings to a "nameless old permaloop uninhabited for centuries" in Siberia.[2] The group included several powerful ymbrynes who would help do the procedure, but it failed and caused a catastrophic explosion.[3] In Library of Souls, Miss Peregrine states that these ymbrynes had been coerced by Caul and were young and inexperienced, which may have contributed to the failure and explosion.[4] The reaction was so strong it lasted a day and a night, and half of Siberia was blown up.[1]
It's unknown if the loop collapse itself or if the procedure going wrong was the cause, but all the Claywings, who had still been inside the loop at its collapse, would be turned into hollowgasts and emerged from the ruins. The Experiment kicked off a hundred year war where the hollows, and eventually wights, would terrorize peculiardom.
Film[]
The Experiment in the film adaptation
Led by Barron, a splinter faction of peculiars called The Society of Syndrigast Scientists were tired of living in loops. Barron believed that immortality could be gained by harnessing the essence of an ymbryne's powers, thus granting the ability to live outside loops, and devised an experiment around this. He and his group kidnapped an ymbryne, uncaring of whether she would survive, and performed the experiment. However, it went wrong and all the participants were transformed into hollowgasts.
Later on, Barron and a few members of his group were able to regain human form by consuming the eyeballs of peculiar children, becoming wights.
Participants[]
Books[]
- Caul
- Myron Bentham (Wasn't at the loop, but caused it)
- Florence Atterton
- Golan
- Horatio
- Jeffrey Dahmer
- Karl Gunderson
- Percival Murnau
- Railroad wight
- The Department Store Santa
- Wesley Bellichek
- Unnamed Claywing members, including a number of 'young and inexperienced' ymbrynes
Film[]
- The Society of Syndrigast Scientists
- A unnamed ymbryne.
Trivia[]
- This event is based on the Tunguska event on June 30th, 1908, where either a comet or asteroid exploded inside the Earth's atmosphere and flattened a large part of the Siberian forest.